Stash Report and Stitching Time 8/27/2023

My stash reduction efforts showed good progress this week, most of it centered on my projects for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I used just under 2 yards for three yellow A Maze Zing blocks, one strippy/scrappy yellow placemat, and the sashing/border on the Tribbles tablerunner. You can see photos of all these projects in yesterday's post.

My other project, which used a little over a yard from my stash, was a set of four Christmas placemats. These were made from a panel that I picked up at a quilt guild meeting, and they have been given back to the guild for donation to Meals on Wheels. I added the batting, backing and binding from my stash.

For the first pair of placemats, I quilted around the designs in the print and stippled the background areas. Double click on the photo above if you want to see more detail. The fabric with gingerbread houses and teddy bears was used on the back.

The second pair of placemats were quilted much more simply, with diagonal lines stitched in golden yellow thread. It was a good way for me to practice free-motion quilting straight lines with a ruler. The backing is a very old Jinny Beyer border stripe. I still have another panel of this same poinsettia print, so you will probably be seeing more of these before too long.

2023 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                        3.00 yards

Used year to date:                   76.25 yards

Added last week:                       0.00 yards

Added year to date:                66.875 yards

Net used in 2023:                 9.375 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. It has been way too hot to spend time outdoors, and I have taken full advantage by spending even more time than usual in the sewing room.

15 Minute Challenge for 2023: 

8/20 - 8/26           7 of 7 days

2023 Total      228 of 238 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Sunny Yellows

How did August disappear so quickly?! It's hard to believe that we are already at the last yellow Saturday for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I've been scrambling to finish up the rest of my RSC projects for the month.

The first set of blocks to be done were my A Maze Zing blocks, based on the pattern by Candace Hassen. My blocks will finish at 13.25" x 19.25", and I am still undecided if they will become a quilt or get made into individual placemats.

After completing the A Maze Zing blocks, I had a pile of 2" yellow and gold scraps and strips on my cutting table. Before I put them away, I used several of them to make this strippy placemat for the August edition of the ABC Table Scraps Challenge at The Joyful Quilter.

Most of the placemats I make will get donated to Meals on Wheels through either of the two guilds I belong to. I had a few more strippy versions from past months, which made a pretty display together on the design wall.

My other scrappy yellow project for the week started with some leftover blocks from a very old quilt top, Tribble Trouble, pieced way back in 1998! (See that quilt and read more HERE.) I joined the extra blocks together, along with some dark blue sashing/border strips, to make this 19" x 42" tablerunner. Blue and yellow have always been a favorite color combination for me.

I have one more set of yellow blocks to finish before the end of the month, but they will have to wait until next week.

Be sure to check out all of the wonderful scrappy projects at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge every Saturday, and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. I'm also linking up to the ABC Table Scraps Challenge at The Joyful Quilter.

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Scrap Pinwheel Lunacy

Most of my quilting time over the past few weeks has been focused on making items for the guild's Christmas market in November--placemats, wallets, zipper pouches, and a tote bag. I haven't had any projects up on the design wall to share for several weeks, but today there's something new.

Pinwheels blocks are one of my favorites to make with half-square triangles. These are just the beginning of what I hope will become an enormous collection of blocks. 

It all started almost a year ago when I won a shoebox-sized bin plus a smaller container of triangle cut-offs at our guild auction. The triangles were all neatly matched up in pairs of print and background (muslin.) It's amazing how many pairs of triangles there were in these two containers!

I've kept those bins next to my sewing machine all year, and frequently used the triangles as my leader and ender pieces. If you aren't familiar with the concept of leaders and enders, check out Bonnie Hunter's blog post HERE. She has even written two books about using them.

After several months of stitching triangle pairs together, the smaller container was full of stitched pairs, and I decided it was time to move on to the next step. I sorted the pairs by fabric, and was very surprised to see how many there were. 

The above photo shows smaller numbers of matching triangles at the bottom and larger groups at the top. In the next photo, I took one of the larger stack of matching triangles and divided them into groups of four. I discovered there were almost 40 of that same fabric.

After pressing up several of the matching groups of triangles, I needed to decide what to do with them. As I said earlier, pinwheels are a favorite of mine for HSTs. As you can see below, the triangles are not all exactly the same size. Many of the have pinked edges, like they came from jelly rolls or charm squares. It takes a little fudging the seam allowances, but I can generally get the points to line up at the center pretty well.

The final step was to trim around the outside of each block. Before trimming, the pinwheels measured about 3.5", but were not consistent. To keep the numbers easy to read on my ruler, I am trimming the blocks down to 3" square. That means they will be only 2.5" finished size!

If I had two more blocks and joined all of these pinwheels together without sashing, I would have a piece measuring only 15" square. That may be the lunacy part of this whole project.

After making the 34 pinwheels blocks, plus stitching all those pairs of triangles that have been sorted, I still have a ton more unstitched triangles in the shoebox. It doesn't look a whole lot different than when I got it a year ago. This may become the eternal pinwheel quilt, but it's a great leader and ender project.

Check out what other quilters are working on this week at Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts and at Monday Musings at Songbird Designs. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA 

Stash Report and Stitching Time 8/20/2023

I was hoping for a sizable change in the stash report total this week, but ended up adding almost exactly the same amount of fabric as was used for the week. After getting very positive reactions from fellow guild members to the little pouches I made for our Christmas market (see them in THIS POST), I hit a sale at the fabric store to get more team fabrics for additional pouches. I ended up with 4.5 yards added to the stash (but I hope to use most of it in the next couple of months.)

My fabric usage total for the week was 4-5/8 yards, just 1/8 yard more than was added to the stash. That included 2-1/4 yards for all the little pouches, 2 yards for a tote bag, and 3/8 yard for the scrappy 16-Patch Stars blocks shared in yesterday's post.

2023 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                       4.625 yards

Used year to date:                   73.25 yards

Added last week:                       4.50 yards

Added year to date:                66.875 yards

Net used in 2023:                 6.375 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I definitely spent more than 15 minutes stitching every day last week. Now I'm planning to take a little break from all the Christmas market projects and catch up on a few other things this week.

15 Minute Challenge for 2023: 

8/13 - 8/19           7 of 7 days

2023 Total      221 of 231 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Yellow Scraps and Stars

August is quickly slipping away, and it's time to get back to my projects for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This week I finally pulled out some 3.5" yellow squares and made two 16-Patch Star blocks, the easiest of my current RSC projects.

It seemed like a good time to check out all of the colors together. I have a total of 16 blocks made for this quilt, but there was only room for nine blocks on the smaller design wall. The blocks finish at 12" square, and my plan is to make 20 of them for a quilt that measures 48" x 60". I've been wondering what colors we have left to add? Definitely teal/turquoise, but it seems like there should be one more besides neutrals. I'll just have to wait and see.

Be sure to check out all of the wonderful scrappy projects at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge every Saturday, and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

I'm Turning Into a Bag Lady!

Most of my stitching time over the past week has been spent on more pieces for the guild's Christmas market in November. After finishing the Diva Wallets (see last week's post HERE,) I continued with the same team fabrics to make sets of zipper pouches. 

The University of Georgia pouches have a very old fabric for the lining, Pointillist Palette in red and black.

The lining for the Georgia Tech pouches is a wavy black and white check.

Here are the pieces for two sets of pouches, plus the zippers for them. Each main fabric has been fused to the lining fabric plus asmall rectangle of interfacing to stiffen the bottom of each pouch. 

I was able to make a total of 11 pouches from these fabrics, and I still have more of the Tech fabric left. They range in size from 2x2x4 for the tiniest size up to 4x4x8 for the largest. The close-up of the UGA pouches shows how the lining fabric changes color.

The pattern that I used for these is "A Little Duffle Do It" by Karen West of For the Love of Fabric. I've made many of these pouches over the years and frequently given them as gifts. I checked, and the pattern is still available at many places online.

After the pouches were finished, I switched over to making a tote bag. For this project, I used the pattern "A Bonnie Bag" by Favorite Things. My copy of this pattern shows a date of 1995 on it, so it may be a little harder to find. I've made a few changes to my version, including eliminating the flap and button closure.

This bag is another that I have made as a gift many times, although it has been several years since the last ones. This time I used a red border stripe print and a coordinating fabric for the lining/contrast. The finished size of the bag is about 14.5" wide x 6.5" deep x 14" high.

There is a zipper across the top (but I'd like to figure out a better way to set the zipper in for the next bag.)

There are two padded outside pockets, one on each side...

and six pockets in the lining.

My biggest concern about the tote bag is how it might be priced for the Christmas market. I know that the fabrics I used for this bag were purchased many years ago, probably for not more than $5-6/yard, and most of the other supplies (zipper, webbing for straps, fleece interfacing) were probably purchased on sale. However, when I calculated the cost of all the supplies to make one bag at current prices, it came to more than $35 (and that's with figuring fabric at only $10/yard.) 

I'm planning to take this bag along to our guild meeting tomorrow and talk to some of the people who have more experience with pricing for the market. I'd be glad to make more of these bags if they think the bags will sell at a reasonable price. Otherwise, I can make many more of those little pouches for the same investment of both money and time.

Linking up with:

Wednesday Wait Loss at Inquiring Quilter

Midweek Makers at Quilt Fabrication

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Stash Report and Stitching Time 8/13/2023

I've been working away this week at projects for our guild's Christmas market, which happens in early November. I recently shared my first completion for the market, three Diva wallets. You can see/read more HERE.

Making the wallets used 1-1/8 yards from my stash, and no new fabric was added this week. I have already started another project with more of the UGA and GA Tech fabrics.

2023 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                       1.125 yards

Used year to date:                 68.625 yards

Added last week:                         0.0 yards

Added year to date:                62.375 yards

Net used in 2023:                   6.25 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I've been quilting every day, finishing up the wallets then starting another project for the market.

15 Minute Challenge for 2023: 

8/6 - 8/12             7 of 7 days

2023 Total      214 of 224 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Diva Wallets Done!

One of my main quilting goals this month was to make a start on some projects for the quilt guild's Christmas market. The market is a major fundraiser for our group, and I don't want to be scrambling at the last minute to get my pieces made.

Up first was a set of Diva Wallets, based on the guild workshop held in May. You can see the wallet I made in that class HERE. I received three extra sets of the metal frames with the agreement that I would use them to make these wallets for the market. Apparently, items made from team fabrics are very popular, so that is what I used for two of them. 

Each wallet has six small pockets for credit cards, two full-width pockets for bills, and a zippered coin pocket. You can see in this photo of the insides that I changed around the placement and direction of the pockets in some  instances.

Each wallet finishes about 7.5" wide and 4.25" high when closed, 8.5" long open. The Diva Wallet pattern is from Sew Many Creations, and they also sell the metal frames at that site.

Here are some close-ups of each wallet.

I still have more of the team fabrics and will use them in other bags/zipper pouches. That is the next project on the list.

Linking up with:

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Finished or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA

Stash Report and Stitching Time 8/6/2023

There's good news and bad news from my sewing room this week. The good news is that I have been busy joining together all those many blocks for the Modern Quilt Studio 2023 Summer Camp Mystery, and I now have a finished quilt top! The bad news is that the designers of the mystery quilt (Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr of Modern Quilt Studio) have asked us to refrain from posting photos of our quilts/tops until the official reveal date of September 1st. I'm going to give a little sneak peek in the meantime. It doesn't really look much different than earlier posts sharing some of the blocks on the background fabric.

Because this quilt top is finished, I'm finally going to include it in my stash report. I used a total of 7 yards in this top, and there was no new fabric added this week. I'm back in the black!

2023 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                          7.0 yards

Used year to date:                   67.50 yards

Added last week:                         0.0 yards

Added year to date:                62.375 yards

Net added in 2023                5.125 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I spent the early part of the week assembling the mystery quilt, then switched over to some projects for the guild's Christmas fair.

15 Minute Challenge for 2023: 

7/30 - 8/5             7 of 7 days

2023 Total      207 of 217 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch Challenge at Life in Pieces. 

Happy quilting everyone!

Julie in GA